Into Hostile Territory
by more-than-words
Summary: The small, once-abandoned logging town of Puerto Verde didn't seem like the kind of place to stage a revolution, and yet... Elizabeth is in trouble and Henry is determined to get her out, no matter what. Written for the fic exchange.
1. Chapter 1

This is for the winter fic exchange and is version two of the prompt 'Henry has to rescue Elizabeth from a bad situation by flying a plane.' Thanks to everyone on Tumblr who offered plane-related help and advice, you are all amazing and wonderfully knowledgeable and saved me from heading down the rabbit hole of the internet. I owe you.

I'm not yet entirely sure how this fic is going to go (you may need to suspend your disbelief ever so slightly as the plot heads ever further off-kilter haha) but I hope you enjoy this first little chapter :)

* * *

 **Chapter One**

 _86 hours in_

Sweat. He was very conscious of the sweat.

It soaked into his clothes and dripped from his hairline and made his hands slippery as he worked to adjust the controls in front of him. He had forgotten about the sweat in the years since his retirement from the Marines. It got into his eyes, making them sting and water.

Henry McCord blinked rapidly to clear his vision. This was a situation he could not afford to mess up. It had to go perfectly; there was so much riding on this one flight.

A crackle came over his headphones, followed by a disembodied voice. "Still there, buddy?"

He lifted one hand to adjust the microphone attached to his helmet. "Still here."

"I've had them on the phone again," said the guy on the other end of the communication, the crackling on the line not entirely hiding the discomfort in his tone.

"What are they gonna do? Scramble a jet to stop me?" The only reason he was in the sky to begin with was that they _wouldn't_ officially send up a plane. The only option had been to take matters into his own hands.

There was a pause on the other end. And then, "Are you sure this is –"

"Stop." Henry cut off whatever it was the other man had been planning to say. He could guess. No doubt Joe Clegg was having second thoughts about helping him out. No doubt he'd been getting pressure from people very high up in the chain of command to bring Henry quite literally back down to earth. The pressure would be coming from the Pentagon and the Office of the White House Chief of Staff. And Conrad Dalton would no doubt be pissed as hell so maybe there was even pressure from the Office of the President.

 _Not_ the State Department.

Henry turned off the sound to the voice in his ear and turned his attention back to the view through the window.

Flight conditions were not too good, making the ride choppier than he would have liked. The sky was mostly clear, giving him a good view of the flight path ahead, but there was a hefty wind that buffeted the plane and made him work to keep on track. A particularly nasty pocket of turbulence sent the plane bumping along for several seconds and Henry felt his stomach flip, hands clutched firmly around the controls as he drew closer to his destination.

When the wind lessened again, Henry looked down at the ground below, the trees of the small pocket of rainforest gradually thinning out to be replaced by buildings and open spaces and empty roads, many of which no longer went to any destination, just ran into the trees and stopped abruptly somewhere in the undergrowth.

One working road in, one road out. That was it. That much he knew.

He deliberately overshot the far end of the little coastal town at the edge of the rainforest to fly out over the ocean so he could circle back around, scoping the area. Before he had got in the plane he had already identified his preferred landing spot from satellite photos, but he wanted to get a better lay of the land before descending. Once he landed, he figured he would not have much time to do what he needed to do before getting out again.

His life depended on it – and not just _his_ life.

A bead of sweat rolled down his face and pooled in the groove above his top lip. His stomach rolled as he banked the plane once more, bringing it round in a wide loop preparatory to making his landing.

The sweat and the queasiness, while a mainstay of flying and something he had experienced plenty of times during his career in the Marines, could only partly be blamed on the conditions of the flight. The rest of the blame lay with the fact that his wife was in trouble, and Henry was terrified that he was arriving too late to help her. Terrified at the unknown of what he might find when he landed.

What if the White House and the Pentagon were right, and this was a trap, something set to bait them?

Henry didn't care. If it turned out to be a trap at least he would be with Elizabeth, where he might be able to help her, and could at least make sure that she was protected and not alone. The threat of trouble upon landing only worked to strengthen his resolve, focusing his anger and his terror and the sheer blind worrying panic that had taken up residence inside him three days ago when he was told she was in trouble and that had failed to shift ever since. He didn't care what was thrown at him. He was going to find Elizabeth and get her out. Get them _both_ out and back home safely.

With the plane settled on its path to Henry's chosen makeshift landing strip, he started to bring the aircraft down to the once-abandoned logging town of Puerto Verde.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you to everyone reading this and for all the lovely comments so far! I hope you enjoy this next chapter x

* * *

 **Chapter Two**

 _Two hours in_

"Blake, stop hovering and just come in." Nadine Tolliver didn't even look up from her work as she spoke. There was no need to; she had been aware of Blake hovering intermittently outside her door for the past twenty minutes.

He complied, slipping through the gap and then standing there by the door looking furtive. Looking _anxious_.

Nothing that unusual for Blake. Nadine looked up at him and quirked an eyebrow. "Well?"

"Do you think it's unusual we haven't had a call?"

Nadine took a deep, slow breath and released it just as slowly, needing the moment to make sure she kept her calm. She really wasn't in the mood for other people's cryptic quirks right now. "A call from whom?"

"Diplomatic Security. We usually get a call to say that the Secretary's plane is in the air."

"Right."

"Her plane was due to be wheels up an hour ago but nothing yet."

Nadine lifted one shoulder in a shrug. "It's probably delayed."

"Probably."

She could tell from the expression on Blake's face that he didn't really buy that. There was a look of unease gracing his features that he only wore when he had a bad feeling about something – a look that often instilled the same sense of unease in Nadine, not that she would ever admit to it without first having incontrovertible proof of a problem. So she said, "Here's a novel idea, Blake. Don't make them do all the chasing. Relationships work both ways. Why don't you call them?"

Blake looked like he hadn't thought of that yet. "I could do that."

"Do that."

He nodded and disappeared from her office, looking marginally happier for having something to do. Nadine turned back to the work that sat in front of her on her desk, but found herself unable to focus. Because Blake was right. They should have had a call by now.

* * *

 _8 hours in_

The DS agents hadn't left yet, and he thought that was strange.

Elizabeth had called Henry just over eight hours ago to tell him that she was just about to leave to go to catch her plane back to Andrews, and by his calculations, she should already have landed by now.

And if that was the case, at least two of the guys currently stationed out the front of the house should have been due to go and join the security contingent waiting to meet her at the airbase and bring her home, but they still sat in their cars, engines idling.

It set Henry's senses on edge as he glanced out the window for possibly the twentieth time that evening since getting home from the War College. He knew that probably Elizabeth's plane had just been delayed for some reason, most likely because she had been diverted to another meeting before she could leave, but still.

He thought that she should be home by now.

Standing in the window of the office he shared with Elizabeth, he pulled out his phone and dialled her cell, holding it to his ear to listen to it ring.

"Have you become a nosy neighbour in your old age?"

"Hmm?" Henry spun around to find Jason crossing from the kitchen, eating leftover garlic bread from dinner, like he hadn't already eaten three slices and a plate of pasta. And dessert.

His son swallowed a mouthful. "Staring out of the window like a stalker. Anything good happening?" Then he frowned. "You on the phone?"

"Oh. No." Elizabeth's cell was ringing out, and Henry gave up on the call, putting his phone back in his pocket and giving his youngest a smile. "Just trying to get hold of Mom."

He didn't know why he had an uneasy feeling when he said it. There was no reason for it. No reason to worry. But he was worrying, and he knew that it came across in his voice and he knew that Jason picked up on it.

"She's late back?" Jason stuffed more garlic bread in his mouth, wearing that carefully nonchalant expression he always wore to disguise any unease he might be feeling.

Henry nodded. "Yeah." _Stop talking_. If he said anything else to Jason, he'd only make it worse for both of them, which was stupid when it had no basis in fact. Except it wasn't so long ago that their family had a stalker, and from time to time Henry was still prone to think that every little diversion from a plan, every late appearance by Elizabeth or one of the kids, meant that something awful had happened. He tried to keep that tendency away from the kids, but who the hell was he trying to fool?

They felt the worry, too.

Movement outside the window caught his eye and Henry turned back to the glass to see one of the DS agents getting out of the car and going to talk to the driver in the car behind. Then she got out of the car too and they stood talking in the street like… something. Nothing. Pointless – it was pointless to read into a conversation he couldn't even hear, but the looks on their faces was kind of like –

"Dad, your phone." Jason was pointing at Henry's pocket where his cell phone had started to vibrate.

"Yeah, thanks." Distractedly, he pulled out the phone and answered the call, gaze still fixed on the agents talking in the street. "Hello?"

He hadn't bothered to look at the caller display and so he was surprised when the voice on the other end said, "Hold please for the President."

Then there was a few seconds of silence followed by a beep, and then Conrad Dalton, doing his very best _stay calm_ voice, said, "Henry, we've got a bit of a situation... It's about Elizabeth."

OK, he thought, fear already rolling in his gut and sweat breaking out on the back of his neck as he turned to fully face the window the better to see the agents outside, and the better to hide his face from his son standing a few feet behind him. OK, yeah. Now it might be time to worry.

* * *

 _One hour, thirty minutes in_

Sleep.

That was her first thought. She just wanted to sleep. Why wouldn't they be quiet so she could go back to sleep?

Elizabeth felt consciousness tickling at her, teasing her back to wakefulness, tempting her with daylight, but she just needed to sleep, needed to be in the dark so that she could drift away and let her mind rest.

She was lying on something uncomfortable, and her shoulders were aching and her mouth was dry, but the lure of sleep was so great she didn't care about a little discomfort. She let her thoughts drift away as quickly as they had come.

Wait. No.

 _Don't sleep._

She shouldn't want to sleep. She needed to be awake, because something had happened, she was sure of it. Something bad, something that meant she needed her wits about her. She was sure that there had been a problem, but she couldn't quite coalesce her thoughts enough to bring them together into a coherent whole. _What_ was it that she needed to be awake for?

Unconsciousness was pulling her back down and she fought against it for several seconds but, damn, she was tired. So unexpectedly, unusually tired for the middle of the day. Something wasn't right, that much she knew, but it was impossible to resist it, impossible not to give in to the sleep she was craving, the sleep she couldn't fight.

Elizabeth felt the last wisps of consciousness drifting away, lulled back to slumber by the rumble of an engine and the movement of a vehicle and a man's unfamiliar voice telling her not to fight.


	3. Chapter 3

Apologies for the delay with this chapter, I've been struggling a little bit with the plot... hope this is OK! x

* * *

 **Chapter Three**

 _Nine hours in_

"What do you mean my wife is missing?" He said it quietly, but he didn't need volume for the words to carry across the Oval Office. The force behind them was enough for them to carry.

Henry McCord had elected to stay standing for this audience with the President, too on edge to sit and too easily able to recognise this for what it was: a carefully managed effort to break the news to him. An effort to _handle_ him.

"Her plane was due to take off from the airbase around nine hours ago," said Nadine Tolliver, looking up at Henry as she sat on a couch next to Russell Jackson. "Only it never did."

Henry had been surprised to find Nadine present for the meeting, but he was glad of it. She wasn't given to bullshit, so even though the grave expression on her face when he had entered the room hadn't done much to inspire confidence in him, at least he knew she'd give it to him straight. And she would be in Elizabeth's corner, no matter what. "She didn't make it to the plane?"

"There was an ambush." From his position leaning against the Resolute desk, Conrad Dalton spoke up. He pushed away from the desk and walked over to lean his forearms against the back of an armchair next to Henry. "Some of her team made it to the airbase and have taken shelter there."

 _An ambush_. What the hell did that even mean? It sounded like something they should have seen coming but didn't, and it sounded like his wife was in trouble because of it, and Henry was not OK with that fact. Then he registered the second part of what Conrad had told him. "Wait. _Some_ of her team?"

Everyone else in the room suddenly failed to meet Henry's eye. "There were some fatalities," Russell eventually said. "Two DS agents and three State Department staffers that we know about, plus a local guide. Three DS guys and a couple of staffers made it back to the airbase, and three DS agents are still missing."

There were so many questions that Henry could ask in response to that but there was currently only one that he cared about. "And Elizabeth?"

Suddenly no one wanted to look at him again, and the feeling of empty dread in his gut bottomed out. "Where is my wife?" Henry demanded.

The three of them exchanged glances as though silently debating who got to break the news to him, and whether they should try to sugar coat it when they did. Eventually, Nadine rolled her eyes at the others and said to Henry, "One of the staffers reported seeing her taken from her car and put into another vehicle, which drove off."

"You mean she was abducted."

"Yes."

OK. Now he needed to sit down. Vision swaying wildly, worry and panic and anger all swirling inside him and battling for dominance, Henry staggered around an end table to sit down opposite Nadine and Russell. Head in his hands, breaths shallow and juddering. "And now?" he said, when he had managed to quell his nausea enough to be able to lift his head and look Conrad in the eye. Conrad, the President, who was the reason Elizabeth had gone on the trip in the first place and who was ultimately responsible for anything that happened to her while she was there. Conrad, who was their friend and whom Henry had been pleased to vote for twice, but whom he wouldn't hesitate to blame if necessary. "You don't know where she is?"

The three of them exchanged another look that suggested they'd really rather not be having the conversation. Henry knew the feeling. _Elizabeth, God._ If she didn't make it back -

Conrad lowered himself into the chair next to Henry. "Actually," he said, pursing his lips together in something that might have been regret, "we know exactly where she is."

* * *

 _0 hour_

The long road to the airport seemed as though it was never going to end.

Elizabeth McCord sat back in her seat, closing the file she held on her lap, too car-sick now to continue even pretending trying to work on the final leg of the journey back to her plane. Despite the many virtues she had experienced in this part of the world, reliably smooth road surfaces was not one of them. Nor was the humidity, which had been giving her a headache since she landed three days previously.

She closed her eyes and rested her head against the back of her seat, willing either the road or her stomach to stop jumping – preferably both. It wouldn't look good if she were to vomit on the tarmac as soon as the car door opened upon arrival at the airbase. There might be press around and that would _not_ make for a pretty front page.

At least the run back was pretty clear. There hadn't been much traffic at all on this long road that ran through a splice in the rainforest and connected two cities without all that much in between, and the journey, while unfortunately bumpy, had been fairly swift.

Until now.

The car was slowing, and Elizabeth could hear the DS agents in the front seat making noises of consternation at the hold up. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes to see what was going on. "Have we hit traffic?"

"Looks like a fallen tree blocking the road, Ma'am."

Elizabeth craned her neck to see – her agent was right. Thirty or so metres away there was a large tree lying across the road, something she knew was not unheard of in this part of the world. She had met with local charity workers the day before who had told her that soil erosion and heavy rain sometimes caused landslips in the rainforest, which sometimes caused things like this to happen. "Can we get around it?" she asked.

One of the DS agents from the car at the front of the motorcade had climbed out of the vehicle to have a look, and he was joined by one of the junior State Department staffers who had come with her on this trip to tour some of the smaller South American countries and work to build consensus on Conrad Dalton's new climate initiative. The two of them walked towards the tree.

There was the unexpected sound of a vehicle revving noisily close by. Then a jeep sped suddenly out of the trees to the right, hurtling across the small space.

"Oh, my God." Elizabeth's hand flew to her mouth and she jerked reflexively against her seatbelt before she froze in shock.

There was no time to react.

The jeep slammed into the car in front, taking down the DS agent and the junior staffer along the way before crunching sickeningly into the metal of the armoured vehicle. It wouldn't have done irreparable damage to the car, but to her staff…

She had seen the spray of blood, and then she felt sick for a reason much more serious than an uncomfortable car ride on a bumpy road.

 _Oh God, oh God, oh God._

Everything was frozen for several long seconds. Then one of the DS agents in the front seat snapped back to business and launched himself into the back and pulled Elizabeth down, pushing at her back with one hand and unbuckling her seatbelt with the other as he dragged her to the floor of the car. She complied; he hadn't given her time to react or protest, and she found her cheek pressed to the scratchy carpet on the floor of the car, held there by the firm hand of her agent on her back. His other hand was on her head, whether to shield her or keep her down she wasn't sure.

The car engine revved and the gears crunched, preparatory to making a getaway in reverse.

Then the gunshots and the shouting.

Then the shattering glass.

Then the feel of something warm and wet against her arm, and she knew without seeing it that it was blood, and she knew from the dead weight on top of her what had happened to her DS agent and it was familiar, too familiar, too much like Iran, except this time she wasn't in the house of a friend with friendly security forces nearby, she was in the middle of nowhere, miles from a city or even a village, and there was no time at all to react.

Then the weight on top of her was gone and her ears were ringing from the noise and somebody said something but she didn't know the voice, and before she could sit up there was a sharp sting against her bicep followed by a warmth that spread through her veins and pulled her back down, down, and the last thing she remembered was the feel of the scratchy car carpet against her cheek as someone pulled her towards the open rear door and out and away towards the rainforest.


	4. Chapter 4

I'm so sorry for the delay in this chapter. I had a plot-related crisis. I'm still trying to piece it together but hopefully it'll shake itself out soon. I'll get the next bit out faster, I promise! Anyway, I hope you like this little instalment and please let me know what you think :)

* * *

 **Chapter Four**

 _86 hours in_

Henry knew that the people on the ground would have seen his plane by now.

Most likely they would have been aware of it for at least a few minutes, would have seen him circling as he scoped the area before coming in to land. Most likely they were readying their defences, possibly thinking that they were under attack.

He would have to be smart if he was going to avoid getting shot within seconds of landing.

Moments away now, he made his final checks as he brought the little plane in to land. He had chosen for his landing place a straight stretch of road to the northern edge of the town, one which started at the sea and ran to precisely nowhere, the land having been claimed back by the rainforest when the town was abandoned decades ago.

It wasn't abandoned any more.

Henry brought the plane down towards the rainforest end of the road, bracing himself for the impact of landing and saying a prayer to any God that happened to be listening that his plan worked. He didn't want trouble.

All he wanted was to find his wife and bring her home.

Elizabeth McCord was no damsel in distress, Henry was fully aware of that, but looking at the situation as he had sat in Washington he had been unable to fathom exactly how she was going to get herself out of the situation she found herself in, especially once he had found out who was holding her and the grudge he held against Elizabeth. She needed help, and when it had become apparent that none was going to be forthcoming from Conrad in any timeframe acceptable to Henry, he had found it necessary to step up.

He wasn't about to sit idly by while she was in trouble, and no doubt scared out of her mind. He had a duty to protect his wife and, more than that, he loved her above all else. He wasn't about to lose her now. He wouldn't be able to live with himself, or look her in the eye ever again if he did nothing. He wouldn't be able to look their kids in the eye.

The ground was getting closer now, closer, and then the wheels touched down and Henry felt the jolt throughout his whole body as the plane made contact with the earth. He applied the brakes and brought the plane to a gradual stop, before taking the time to manoeuvre it to face the other way, out over the ocean. He thought it would be worth the extra minute in the cockpit; there was a chance he and Elizabeth might need to make a very speedy getaway, and it would be easier if he had a clear runway to work with instead of a short run directly into the trees.

Finally at a complete standstill, Henry completed the task of shutting down the plane. Legs shaky and stomach still fragile from the flight, he climbed carefully from the cockpit and lowered himself down to the ground.

Time to move.

* * *

 _Five hours in_

She woke a few minutes before she actually opened her eyes.

Elizabeth had been drifting in and out of consciousness for… she wasn't sure for how long. Several hours at least, she thought. She knew she had been moving for quite a long time, the hum and roll of a vehicle making her head spin and her stomach flip. She could feel a pain in her ribs where she had been lying on a metal ridge during the journey.

She was still now, definitely not in a vehicle.

She held herself steady and tried to force her mind to focus. There was something firm but yielding beneath where she lay – a cheap mattress? It was hot, too hot, and her head hurt, she thought from a combination of the heat and the stress and whatever drugs had been jammed into her veins by the people who grabbed her.

The people who grabbed her… She was assaulted by the memory of the spray of blood and bodies flying through the air as her convoy was attacked, and of the weight of one of her DS agents pressing her down into the scratchy carpet that covered the floor of her car. The too-heavy weight of one of her DS agents…

Oh God.

Panic made a play for her mind. Her throat felt constricted and her chest felt like there was a band tight around it. Her hands clenched into fists as she felt her heart stutter hard against her ribs.

 _Don't you dare panic, Elizabeth_.

At least she was still alive, unlike so much of her detail and the team that had come with her on this trip to South America to promote Conrad's new climate change initiative. So many of them were dead, and so many of them could be dead _or_ alive; she had no idea. They could be anywhere. But giving in to the panic that started to swirl within her would be doing them all a disservice.

Someone needed to be held accountable for the ambush in the rainforest, and she needed to find out what the hell was going on. Someone needed to pay. And she needed to get out.

Forcing herself to regulate her breathing, Elizabeth pushed the panic back down and let fierce indignation take its place – coupled with a healthy dose of low-level fear, which she figured was acceptable in the circumstances. Who the hell had taken her, and what the hell did they want?

Only one way to find out.

She opened her eyes slowly, blinking into grimy daylight bolstered by yellow electric light that bounced off the cheap ceramic patterned tiles that lined the floor a couple of feet below her. She could hear the hum of a nearby motor.

And she could hear a creak from somewhere just in front of her, and the sound of someone else's rasping breath. Head still foggy and thoughts still somewhat clouded, she looked up.

A man sat in a metal folding chair about two metres from where she lay on the hard, uncomfortable bed. Arms folded across his generous stomach. Feet pressing back against the tiles to rock the chair backwards. Sweat patches under his arms. His eyes fixed on her face.

Elizabeth looked back at him. Blinked to clear her vision. Froze. Time stilled. She knew the man's face. Recognised him straight away even though she had seen him mostly in photographs and only ever met him once in the flesh, even though she hadn't seen him at all in more than twenty years.

Yeah. She was definitely in trouble now.


	5. Chapter 5

Um. I am (again) very sorry for the epic delay in this chapter. Very very sorry, I am terrible. Thank you all so much for all the lovely support so far, I really really appreciate it and one day this story will definitely be finished. If anyone is still reading this, I hope you enjoy chapter five :D

* * *

 **Chapter Five**

 _Ten hours in_

"This is Puerto Verde." National Security Advisor Ellen Hill pushed the map closer to Henry, pointing at the little space at the edge of a rainforest that was the place Elizabeth was being held. "It used to be a logging town back in the day, but then the laws were tightened up and the local company went bust and the town died."

"Only now it's back from the dead," interjected Russell Jackson as he sat staring at his phone at the other end of the table in the Chief of Staff's office.

Henry stared hard at the map as though if he looked closely enough, he would be able to see his wife. The last two hours had been some of the most surreal of his life, but running through everything he had found out, everything he had been told, was the crushing fear that Elizabeth was in trouble. He stared at the map because it helped him to rationalise the situation. He stared at the map because otherwise he'd be staring at the picture of Elizabeth's face that had been sent through as proof of life, and then he wouldn't be able to concentrate at all.

He couldn't help her if he was sobbing over a photo.

"So she's been held somewhere there?" Henry asked Ellen Hill, gesturing to the map.

"Yes. We should have more detailed satellite photos within the hour."

"We've got planes in the sky?"

"I can't give you more specific details, Dr McCord."

Henry had to stop himself from slamming his fist down on the table in frustration. For the past two hours, they'd been telling him things but not telling him things. Giving him information but only taking it so far, and it was driving him crazy. His anger wasn't really directed at Ellen Hill – he knew that there was something Russell and Conrad weren't saying, and it involved Elizabeth, and he wanted to know.

He thought about what they had told him so far about what had happened, trying to pinpoint the thing that had sparked his instincts that they were holding back something important. They had said that Elizabeth's motorcade was ambushed, and half of her team were killed in the assault before she was snatched away in a vehicle. Then there were several hours unaccounted for, before somewhere just after the start of hour six, a video had been sent to the CIA from a guy called General Carlos Rumero Munoz, informing them that he had the Secretary of State held hostage in Puerto Verde, and in order to secure her release, would Conrad Dalton please release from jail some of his friends that were currently incarcerated in the United States? He had also let it be known that further demands would soon be made, and he had followed up the video with a photo of Elizabeth to prove that he had her.

Casting the map aside, Henry looked again at the photograph that had been printed out and given to him by Nadine before she went off with Conrad to place an urgent phone call to the US embassy in Guyana, where Puerto Verde was located. Henry thought that Elizabeth looked defiant in the picture, which was good, but her eyes were slightly unfocused and there was a tension at her jaw that suggested she was only just holding it together, which was bad. The fact it was only a head and shoulders shot didn't give much away, but she seemed at least to be unharmed as far as Henry could tell.

Wait.

He had just thought what it was that had triggered something in him. _This guy…_

They had still been in the Oval Office at that point, Conrad and Russell and Nadine and Henry. Nadine had just finished recounting the sequence of events so far and had played the video for Henry, and while Henry had sat watching the screen with mounting horror, Conrad Dalton had been pacing in front of the desk.

"He's proposing a trade?" Henry had said when he had collected himself together enough to speak again.

The President had scoffed and said, "This guy –" Then he had abruptly stopped and caught himself before saying, in a calmer tone, "We're trying to establish a connection with him as we speak, Henry. He suggests that there are more demands to be made so we're doing what we can to find out what those are as soon as possible. I promise you that we're doing everything we can to help Elizabeth."

Then Nadine had passed him the photo and Henry's attention had been entirely focused on his wife's heat-flushed, slightly frightened face and he hadn't thought about anything else for a while.

 _This guy._ The way that the President had said it… "Russell?" Henry said, forcing the Chief of Staff to look up from his phone. "Tell me how Dalton knows General Rumero Munoz."

* * *

 _Five hours in_

"Good afternoon, Madam Secretary." General Rumero Munoz sat forward in his chair as Elizabeth blinked up at him, a smile splitting his jowly face that could very well have been genuine.

Who the hell was she kidding? Of course his smile was genuine. Look at the ace he held. Elizabeth ignored him and instead focused her attention on sitting up without jarring her foggy head too much, and without showing her discomfort on her face. She wasn't about to let the bastard know she was struggling. She managed to push herself up and then swung her legs over the edge of the bed, gripping hard onto the thin mattress to steady herself when her vision swam wildly from the movement, and biting her lip to keep in a groan.

She noticed that he hadn't bothered to restrain her, and that was interesting, although she was pretty sure they'd tied her up in the car that brought her here. She remembered waking briefly to find her shoulders pulling uncomfortably, and she could still feel a slight sting at her wrists like the delicate skin had been bitten into by rope or cable ties. Elizabeth glanced down.

The lower right sleeve of her blouse was saturated from cuff to elbow with drying blood. She couldn't keep in the gasp of shock.

"The blood is not yours," the man said.

Planting her feet squarely on the floor, trying to look as full of intent as she could when she still couldn't gather herself enough to stand, Elizabeth fixed him with a glare. "I know that," she snapped. "It's from one of my DS agents, who's dead because of you."

He tilted his head. "How are you feeling now?"

"What are you doing? What is this?" She wasn't about to get into a discussion about her _feelings_ , at least not until she felt collected enough to unleash a tirade that would let the bastard know exactly how she felt about the situation and what he had done. But she still didn't have enough information about what was going on, and she could still feel the drugs in her system weighing her down, and she wasn't about to let him see her cry.

He leaned back in his chair, pushing off again from the ground to rock the chair backwards, the front legs leaving the ground. The metal groaned under his weight. "I'm declaring independence, Madam Secretary."

"What?"

The chair dropped back into position and the General leaned forward once again. Elizabeth forced herself to stay stock still even as he leaned close enough to be able to reach out and touch her if he wanted to. "I assume from your lack of questions on the subject that you recognise me," he went on.

She slowly sucked in a breath and held it for a minute. She thought about how to respond. There was no point denying that she recognised the General from an operation she had worked on while she was employed by the CIA, especially not when she had spent so long tracking him and not when she had met the man once before. The question she wanted answering was whether what he was currently doing had anything to do with back then, or if he was engaged in a new venture that just so happened to require him to abduct her. Knowing his background as she did, Elizabeth guessed the odds were about even. "I do," she replied, releasing the held breath on a rush of air. "And you very obviously know me."

The General gave her a smile that could almost be called friendly. "In all your guises," he said. Then he spread his arms wide open. "Welcome to Puerto Verde."


End file.
